Dem rats deserting beach bum Charlie

Last Updated: 4:37 AM, March 3, 2010

Posted: 3:51 AM, March 3, 2010

Comments: 9

Charles Hurt

WASHINGTON -- The congressional whale otherwise known as Rep. Charles Rangel has finally been beached.

Just weeks ago, Democrats were bellowing about the need to let the House Ethics Committee finish its investigation.

Now, suddenly, they want to throw the chairman of the most powerful committee in Congress overboard.

Turns out, those principles were not what they were standing on but the pillars they were hiding behind.

RADIOACTIVE RANGEL ON BRINK OF EXIT

The most deeply cutting defection came last night from Rep. Artur Davis, an Alabama Democrat who not only sits on Rangel's powerful tax-writing committee but is a member of the Congressional Black Caucus.

Brigitte Stelzer

TIRED OLD CHARLIE: Ways and Means Committee boss Charlie Rangel, lounging in the Dominican in 2008, will have more free time once he's stripped of his chairmanship.

Rangel co-founded the highly influential caucus, which has put enormous pressure on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to keep him at the helm of his committee, while the Ethics Committee takes its time sorting through Rangel's transgressions.

The sudden desertion by Davis and a slew of other Democrats comes after the ethics panel issued Rangel a wrist-slapping "admonishment" last week over violating House rules.

Other House members charged with the same violation got away scot-free.

The "admonishment" Rangel got is nothing compared to what he faces over the other concrete charges that we know about.

He was quadruple-dipping on rent-stabilized apartments in New York City, he got his taxes all wrong on his Dominican villa, and he filed at least seven years' worth of wildly incorrect -- or falsified -- financial-disclosure forms.

Perhaps there are four different Charlie Rangels and they each deserve their own rent-stabilized apartments.

And possibly he paid the taxes on his beach villa but the government tore up his checks.

And maybe Rangel accidentally filed the correct financial-disclosure forms in invisible ink and we haven't found them yet.

But, that's unlikely.

Put simply, you don't need a congressional ethics committee to tell you these things are dead wrong.

They are things you and I go to jail over -- without passing Go. But not Charlie Rangel.

And fellow Democrats covered for him out of deference to the mission of the Ethics Committee.

Not anymore.

They are fleeing from him faster than do Christians a whore in church.

So, what changed?

Well, it's pretty simple.

No longer is it just Charlie Rangel's tail in the fiery sling. Democrats looked down and, for the first time, smelled their own tails burning in that sling, too.

Voters -- seething with anger over a health-care bill they don't want, mushrooming debt and rising taxes -- view Rangel as the face of Democrats' corrupt behavior.

The first to bail on him are those running for re-election in tough districts. Davis is running for governor in a highly Republican state. There will only be more.

Nothing makes these people slither faster than when their own self-interest is at stake.

churt@nypost.com

Topics

Comments (9)

Post Your Comment

Report Abuse

kelley in virginia

03/03/2010 9:37 PM

the Republican Party of Virginia wasted no time today airing an ad pointing out 3 freshman Virginia congressmen who have taken campaign money from Charlie Rangel. Nye, Connolly & Perriello. they are all in highly competitive districts.

to them i say "yes we can".
Report Abuse

BrianJ

03/03/2010 7:45 PM

the democratic leadership is corrupt to the core, people finally seeing liberalism for what it is, shared misery, vote these bums out !!!!!
Report Abuse

Omen

03/03/2010 5:45 PM

The blood is in the water.
More demorats to drown or get eaten by 11/2.
Report Abuse

ThrowThisSniggletInJailNow

03/03/2010 10:06 AM

That jigger sure can snore!!!!!
Report Abuse

slick willy

03/03/2010 9:18 AM

Cholly, Cholly, Cholly, the face of NY politics?
Report Abuse

Robt

03/03/2010 9:14 AM

This is a major step for a party that has allowed a KKK member (R. Byrd) and a murderer (T. Kennedy)to act as their longest serving senators. Oh that's right, Charlie is black so so much for that party of inclusion thingy from dumbocraps that tried filibuster after filibuster to defeat the passage of the 64' civil rights act.
Report Abuse

tormentedjetfan

03/03/2010 9:07 AM

Pelosi reminds me of Captain Reynaud in the movie,
Casablanca. "I'm shocked to find out there is gambling going on here" as some one hands him his gambling winnings. They all should be investigated.
Elections should be funded from taxes.No outside campaign contributions. The seniority system of committee appointees in Congress should be ended.
Chairmanships should be given on the basis of experience and merit and then voted on by members.
Get the incompetents out of the leadership posts.
There should be a general pleblescite on any new entitlement programs. This should be left to the people not to the members of Congress. A nation of 300 million should not be governed by 535 people.They are bankrupting our nation and our children.When you vote ask if these people believe in a one world government or the USA.
LOOK AT THEIR VOTING RECORDS. THE GLOBALISTS
belong to both Parties. Vote for America first candidates. God help America
Report Abuse

mani0631

03/03/2010 7:52 AM

One think that Obama is doing, without he realized. Is that bringing people to be chastised for things that they have done, can not be consider racist any longer.
Manuel